Monday 30 September 2013

Balancing September

Trying to balance running and cycling... and family, and work, and M.Ed, and .........
This is a post that also appears on Watershedathlete.blogspot.com.

September has nearly come to a close. It started with a Meet Your Maker experience, that was very, very enjoyable and disappointing all in one, and ends with a decision to can the cyclocross season altogether. Along the way included 45 hours of physical activity, nearly 370kms of running on the month, the start of the SFU HEAL Masters in Education, along with the September start up at school.

Finding Balance--the test of ones life:

Sunday 29 September 2013

Exploring the Body and Mind: Making Connections

Think about the greatest moment in sport that you witnessed happening live, or even the most moving musical performance that had the pleasure of experiencing. Maybe it was the gold medal hockey game at the Olympics in 2010. Maybe you took in the Justin Timberlake concert this past summer (Timberlake is a quintuple threat--he can sing, dance, act, he is a comedian, and he is... a bit of a heart-throb. According to my wife. Yeah...that's it. My wife...)

Our SFU HEAL seminar discussions have revolved around many topics, but there is one main question of inquiry:

What is the connection between the mind and body. What is the relationship?

In our classes, HEAL candidates have taken part in many physical exercises and games. Our professor, Stephen, has challenged HEAL students with activities that, if practiced often enough, would help to rewire our bodies and how we use them. This, in turn, challenges our traditional movement brain routines. As a highly active person, I have difficulty moving my body in ways that are out of my movement pathway routine ( a la running trails or biking all sorts of different terrain). The familiar repetition I experience in those movement strengthens me to do those movements more efficiently the next time I do them again. Over time, I build fitness and my efficiency increases: exercise becomes easier if I do those movements

If I am not biking or running, I am engaging different muscles, some that may or may not be tuned to unfamiliar movements. These new activities and games in class take a bit of time to get used to, but with practise, I can figure out how they work to get by.

For years I have used similar games in my classroom for team and community building exercises, and to break the crippling ice of a classroom full of newbie drama 8 students. However, from my first class in the HEAL program, I am beginning to understand the value of such play activities as a link that connects the mind and body, and just how important that link is.

Rene Descarte, the father of modern philosophy, suggested that the body acts as a machine, and the mind controls that machine. Descartes believed that the mind and body were separate, part of a dualism the addressed in the 17th century. His notions of dualism far reaching implications to how we think and behave today. Our tempered, rational, cognitive, thinking mind has trumped our living in the moment, instinctive, reactive animal brain. Hooray for modern philosophy!!  We can rationalize! We can reason!! We are the pinnacle of all living beings. A win for the evolution of Homo sapiens!!

Or is it?

What we have lost in this Cartesian belief is the autonomy of, or connection to our body and it's ability to be guided by our heart--some may call it our gut--response to situations, and how and when we react to those situations.
Sport, the arts, music, play--all are platforms for us to be able to create, allow our minds to flow, and simply just be. At its best they allow us to exist and live in the moment, be guided by our heart, and perform with a vigor and vitality. Think of amazing performances that transcend what we think is possible for ourselves, and for humankind. Those performances keep us engaged because of the very nature that we cannot help but watch anything else.


Performances as the ones above are magnificent: highly rehearsed, planned, and executed, and very commercial. It is important to note that the connection of mind and body are simply not relegated to a made for TV event. We can experience this connection every day, if we allow ourselves the time to re-train ourselves to think less and act more.

Years ago, I studied at the Vancouver Theatresports League Resident Training Program. For those 6 months with VTSL, we were guided through some challenging yet very creative exercises to access the inner depths of our mind. Doing improv theatre for an audience is something that instantly forces a person to choose, react, create, and be all at the same time, without any thinking taking place, simply reacting.

My former university acting professor, Jim Hoffman, likened the act of improvising to a very simple relationship: Inside our head is a police officer. They are there to help us color in the lines, play by the rules, and allow us to think before we act. When training for improv, that little police officer has to take a coffee break--we must allow ourselves to become uninhibited, and feel while we perform. No offer in improv is a neither good nor bad--it is what we do with it.If a person thinks while engaging in improv, the moment passes, and the work falls flat. Shoring up the time between the idea and the reaction is key for getting quick--in improv it is fast, not funny, witty, thoughtful or contrived that works.

Don't think, do.

The best improvisers are ones who are quick, not clever. The funny, gut wrenching, tear jerking, and beautiful all come from how we interpret their behaviors, in the moment. Improv skills are developed much like muscular fitness develops...

On my way home from the second SFU HEAL session, this beautiful song soothed my soul as the sun was setting. The hauntingly beautiful chorus, in particular, capture my imagination. The connection between mind and body is never more present than when we are in the moment. Perhaps, as Lucinda Williams sings, that moment, our finest moment, is the moment when our time comes to pass......

Sorry to be a killjoy....our own mortality needs to be addressed, respected, and studied in my university studies. I look forward to digging deeper into this question of the relationship between our mind, and our bodies.

Can you think of a time when you experienced your body and mind working together in synchronicity? In posing this question to my students in my classroom, they concurred that the connection is strongest when doing something that they were passionate about.

Also, link a performance of greatness in the comments section below. I would love to have you share something you find to be simply amazing!

Thursday 12 September 2013

A Fresh Experience


Me, according to me: 

My name is Joshua and this is the beginning of a new chapter in my life.

This extension of my strictly race report/ athletics blog at Watershed Athlete is new alternate format that will chronicle my graduate studies at SFU in the Health Education and Active Living/Lifestyle (HEAL) program. I am grateful for this opportunity as it will afford me time to delve into studying avast subject area that I am very passionate about: the health and well being of not only myself and my family, but of the conditions, notions, definitions, and societal aspects of health. I will share my findings with you along the way, and perhaps challenge the readership of Watershed Athlete with what I will discover.

I have worked in education and recreation for the last 18 years, 10 of those as a high school teacher. I developed a love of for acting and performance in my elementary school days. Through high school and my undergrad, I managed to transform those experiences into something that has allowed me to share the importance, love, appreciation for and the value of the arts everyday with my students.

The impetus to become a teacher stems from the fact that I had some pretty fantastic ones as role models growing up. I remember the greatest, most beloved teachers that I have ever had the honor to be a student of, or work with. I aspire to embody the qualities that they lived: a mentor who can positively influence the lives of their students. A person who challenges and encourages them to address issues and problems with creative approaches. One who inspires purposeful creativity and helps individuals build and develop their own thinking.

Why HEAL? Why now?